Daily Food & Ag Digest
Every day, the staff of the Genetic Literacy Project scours the Web for stories on a range of agricultural and food issues, including the GMO debate, conventional and organic farming, regulations, new breeding technologies and sustainability. We publish excerpts of those stories and encourage our readers to visit the original publications for the complete stories.
CRISPR gene editing could yield drought-tolerant tomatoes and kiwis that grow in salty soil
Genetic engineering will allow the production of tomatoes and kiwis that are more tolerant to saline lands and will require ...
How a few pioneering botanists prepared us to battle the coronavirus outbreak
When German pathologist Robert Koch discovered the bacterium behind tuberculosis in 1882, he included a short guide for linking microorganisms ...
COVID-19 virus spread prompts food insecurity fears in Africa
The spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus is prompting food insecurity fears in Africa, with some countries already experiencing rising prices, ...
French agriculture minister says glyphosate key to sustainable farming, raising doubts about proposed weedkiller bans
France’s agriculture minister has declared glyphosate is an essential tool of the agroecological transition, raising hopes of a change in ...
Viewpoint: Can pesticides on produce harm you? Not even if you ate 3,624 strawberries in one day
I am a registered dietitian who believes that any form of fruits and vegetables are healthy – organic or conventional ...
‘My cows don’t know about coronavirus’: Why America will have all the food it needs
My cows don’t know about coronavirus. They’re still giving milk on the schedule that they always follow. They love their ...
Next-generation GMO crops poised to make major contributions to sustainable farming and medicine
Transgenic crops have been planted in different countries for over twenty years, starting from 1996. About 191.7 million hectares were planted ...
Oil from GMO canola, high in omega-3 fatty acids, poised to hit US stores in mid-2020
A newly emerging omega-3 canola oil is set to be available in the market by the second quarter of 2020 ...
India cancels royalties seed companies pay Bayer for GMO cotton, threatening foreign investment in nation’s biotech crop sector
India has axed the royalties that local seed companies pay to German drugmaker Bayer AG for Monsanto’s genetically modified (GM) ...
100 best-selling nutrition books give ‘puzzling’ advice, and few written by experts, study shows
Nutritional decisions may be important for health, and yet identifying trustworthy sources of advice can be difficult to achieve. Many ...
Will our ‘insatiable desire’ to eat meat cause the next disease pandemic?
It’s easy for those of us in the Western world to shake our heads at the live wildlife markets in ...
FDA halts food manufacturing facility inspections to slow coronavirus spread
In light of the COVID-19 pandemic and efforts to “flatten the curve,” the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is halting ...
Next-generation insect-resistant crops could beat back pests farmers can’t control with chemicals
To compensate for plant’s reduced defenses, farmers have used insecticides or pesticides to control pests and kill those which attack ...
Customized biotech yeast could make more plant-based proteins and replace artificial food additives
A Brazilian biotech start-up is custom-designing novel, natural yeast strains that can be used to make plant proteins, replace artificial ...
Coronavirus boosts likelihood of food shortage in Kenya as farmers battle crop-destroying locust swarms
Several counties are battling new desert locust invasions despite the ongoing spraying of hatchlings .... Farmers have urged the government ...
Europe fears empty grocery stores amid coronavirus outbreak, but food companies say there’s plenty to go around
Naked supermarket shelves and masked shoppers hoarding pasta have become the iconic images of the coronavirus crisis so far. But ...
Viewpoint: Lack of trust in science on GMOs, vaccines and climate change fuels coronavirus misinformation
What is driving the novel coronavirus infodemic? Fear, uncertainty and opportunistic marketing are all playing a role. But it is ...
Eat a big breakfast to lose weight? This old nutritional adage isn’t backed up by science
Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince and dine like a pauper is an old nutritional adage that at ...
Existing research may downplay environmental benefits of organic farming, new study claims
The environmental effects of agriculture and food are hotly debated. But the most widely used method of analysis often tends ...
Why it’s safe to order food and go grocery shopping during the coronavirus outbreak
President Donald Trump and governors of various states have suggested Americans should avoid restaurants due to the coronavirus pandemic. Instead ...
Plant-based meat titans Impossible Foods, Beyond Meat face local competition as they expand into Asia
From lab-grown "seafood" to dumplings made with tropical fruit instead of pork, rising demand for sustainable meat alternatives in Asia ...
Activist-led lawsuit alleges EPA glyphosate weedkiller approval violated Endangered Species Act
EPA's interim registration approval of glyphosate in January now faces its first court challenge, as a number of food safety, ...
Coronavirus has ‘snarled’ food distribution operations, threatening shortages and higher prices
Global warehouses are stuffed with frozen cuts of pork, wheels of cheese and bags of rice. But as the coronavirus ...
Gene editing might help restore extinct plants used as food, medicine and perfume thousands of years ago
We debate the ethics of reviving extinct species like the passenger pigeon or woolly mammoth, with scientists clamoring to make some ...
Viewpoint: Environmental Working Group’s ‘Dirty Dozen’ produce list stokes pesticide fears in an ‘already anxiety-ridden world’
Each year, the pro-organic think tank Environmental Working Group (EWG) releases its 'Dirty Dozen,' a list of fruits and vegetables ...
Increased seed oil content could make CRISPR-edited Camelina a desireable choice for cooking and animal feed
Yield10 Bioscience, Inc. [on March 19] announced the results from field tests conducted in the 2019 growing season in the ...
College undergraduates embrace biotech after teaching high school students the science behind GMOs
Some college students tested a class on their knowledge of GMOs, or genetically modified organisms. "Two of these chips are ...
